{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.ricketts.senate.gov/news/press-releases/video-ricketts-on-the-schumer-shutdown-senate-democrats-want-to-hold-rural-nebraskans-healthcare-hostage/", "VIDEO: Ricketts on the Schumer Shutdown: \u201cSenate Democrats Want to Hold Rural Nebraskans\u2019 Healthcare Hostage.\u201d", "2025-10-09", "2025", "2025-10", "Republican", "Senate", "NE", "Pete Ricketts", "R000618", "www.ricketts.senate.gov", "ricketts", "https://www.ricketts.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/?jsf=jet-engine:press-list&pagenum=", "scraper", "WASHINGTON, D.C. \u2013 Yesterday, U.S. Senator Pete Ricketts (R-NE) slammed Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer for shutting down the federal government to score political points and appease his radical left base. Ricketts made the comments during his regular conference call with Nebraska media.\n\nWatch the video here.\n\n\u201cFor the 8th day, the government is shutdown,\u201d Ricketts said. \u201cGovernment services have diminished or stopped. Senate Democrats want to hold rural Nebraskans\u2019 healthcare hostage. Important programs like telehealth have lapsed. This is what a Schumer Shutdown looks like.\u201d\n\n\u201cSchumer and his Senate Minority say their \u2018fight\u2019 is about healthcare. That\u2019s not the case. This is about partisan games,\u201d said Ricketts. \u201cDemocrats claim to be fighting for healthcare. The reality is that their policies would harm it. Because of this shutdown, veterans\u2019 services are impacted. Telehealth programs that rural and elderly Nebraskans rely on have lapsed. Hospital-at-home and home-based medicine programs have ended. Women and children can\u2019t apply for WIC. Without a funding solution, WIC will soon run out of money. Those are the costs of this Schumer Shutdown.\u201d\n\nTRANSCRIPT:\n\n\u201cFor the 8th day, the government is shutdown.\n\n\u201cGovernment services have diminished or stopped.\n\n\u201cSenate Democrats want to hold rural Nebraskans\u2019 healthcare hostage.\n\n\u201cImportant programs like telehealth have lapsed.\n\n\u201cThis is what a Schumer Shutdown looks like.\n\n\u201cThe Schumer Shutdown doesn\u2019t have to continue any longer.\n\n\u201cRepublicans are ready to pass a clean Continuing Resolution.\n\n\u201cThat means government spending continues at current levels.\n\n\u201cThe same spending levels President Biden signed into law.\n\n\u201cThat is the Republican position.\n\n\u201cIt is also a bipartisan position.\n\n\u201cSo far, three Senate Democrats have joined us in voting for it.\n\n\u201cExtending current, bipartisan spending levels would secure more time to complete the regular appropriations process.\n\n\u201cThis isn\u2019t new.\n\n\u201cSenate Democrats passed Continuing Resolutions 13 times during the Biden administration.\n\n\u201cNearly 100% of Democrats voted for these specific spending levels four times in the last 18 months.\n\n\u201cThat includes Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who voted yes\u2014all four times.\n\n\u201cFolks, this is hypocrisy.\n\n\u201cSchumer and the Democrats are holding government services hostage.\n\n\u201cThey\u2019re playing political games with people\u2019s lives.\n\n\u201cThis is a Schumer Shutdown.\n\n\u201cIt needs to end now.\n\n\u201cSchumer used to say that holding funding bills hostage was wrong.\n\n\u201cIn 2013, he said: \u2018What if I persuaded my caucus to say:\n\n\u201c\u2019\u2018I\u2019m going to shut the government down.\n\n\u201c\u2018I\u2019m going to not pay our bills unless I get my way.?\n\n\u201c\u2019It\u2019s a politics of idiocy, of confrontation, of paralysis.\u2019\n\n\u201cBy shutting down the government, Schumer and the Democrats are engaged in the very policy that Schumer previously described as idiocy.\n\n\u201cSchumer and his Senate Minority say their \u201cfight\u201d is about healthcare.\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s not the case.\n\n\u201cThis is about partisan games.\n\n\u201cDemocrats are demanding radical, far-left policies that will hurt Nebraskans\u2019 healthcare and raise costs.\n\n\u201cThey\u2019re demanding over $1 trillion of partisan spending in exchange for keeping the government open for four weeks.\n\n\u201cThey\u2019re demanding free healthcare for illegal aliens.\n\n\u201cThey\u2019re demanding that we eliminate the $50 billion Rural Healthcare fund that will directly support healthcare for Nebraskans.\n\n\u201cThey also want to restore a burdensome staffing rule that would force the closing of rural nursing homes in Nebraska.\n\n\u201cDemocrats claim to be fighting for healthcare.\n\n\u201cThe reality is that their policies would harm it.\n\n\u201cBecause of this shutdown, veterans\u2019 services are impacted.\n\n\u201cTelehealth programs that rural and elderly Nebraskans rely on have lapsed.\n\n\u201cHospital-at-home and home-based medicine programs have ended.\n\n\u201cWomen and children can\u2019t apply for WIC.\n\n\u201cWithout a funding solution, WIC will soon run out of money.\n\n\u201cThose are the costs of this Schumer Shutdown.\n\n\u201cServices will continue to be impacted until more sensible Democrats reverse course and re-open the government.\n\n\u201cIf Chuck Schumer really wanted to improve healthcare for Americans, he would keep the government open.\n\n\u201cHe wouldn\u2019t delay healthcare and increase wait times for veterans, families, or rural communities.\n\n\u201cHe wouldn\u2019t cut funding that supports care in rural Nebraska.\n\n\u201cAs the Schumer Shutdown continues, services are going to be harder to access.\n\n\u201cSchumer and the Democrats need to end their hypocrisy.\n\n\u201cThey need to stop harming rural healthcare.\n\n\u201cThey need to open the government.\u201d", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T19:32:54Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.ricketts.senate.gov/news/press-releases/video-ricketts-on-the-schumer-shutdown-senate-democrats-want-to-hold-rural-nebraskans-healthcare-hostage/"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.4681459870189428, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}